The Driver and Read Families First Generation 1. John Driver John married Hester Harris They had the following children: 2. M i. John Driver was born in 1772 and died on 28 February, 1810 Second Generation 2. John Driver (John) was born in 1772 in Dursley, Gloucester, England. He was christened on 25 July, 1773 in Berkley, Gloucester, England and died on 28 February, 1810 in Chapel Row, Sydney, Australia. He was buried on 2 March, 1810 in The Old Burying Ground, George Street, Sydney, Australia From "The Second Fleet - Britain's Grim Convict Armada of 1790" by Michael Flynn Driver, John (c1773-1810). John driver, a cord wainer aged 14, was committed to Gloucester Castle goal on 6 December 1787 charged with assaulting a man at Dursley and stealing a silver watch valued at two guineas (he had actually picked his pocket). He was convicted on a lesser charge of theft and sentenced to seven years transportation at the 15 January 1788 Gloucester Quarter Sessions and was sent on board the "Dunkirk" hulk at Plymouth on 24 June. At the end of November 1789 he was embarked on the "Neptune" transport. Although only seventeen on arrival, Driver displayed an early talent for business in the colony and prospered quickly as a retail trader after the expiry of his sentence in December 1794. In June 1797 he fathered a daughter by the First Fleet convict Elizabeth Needham (b. 1762, tried Old Bailey) baptised Mary at Sydney in July. Needham's parents had been servants in the household of Lady Charlotte Finch (who had been governess to the children of George III) and her son George (later the Earl of Winchelsea). Needham had two children by her first husband, the First Fleet convict William Snailham (who appears to have died). In 1796 she received a 40 acre land grant at Bulanaming in her own name. In March 1796 the couple were living next door but one to the Chapel (which was at the corner of Hunter and Bligh Streets). Elizabeth held the licence of the Wheatsheaf public house at Sydney in 1787-99 and was an able businesswoman in her own right. Around 1799 the couple went back to England and returned to the colony as free settlers with three children on the "Minorca" in 1801. From June 1803 Driver and his wife operated a warehouse and general store at No. 3 Chapel Row (later known as Castlereagh Street) Sydney, on an 81 rod lease allotment adjoining Thomas Taber's school. He also occupied premises on a site adjoining the new bridge in Sydney. This was probably the 66 rod allotment he leased jointly with Simeon Lord in July 1809 at the north end of the row on the west side of the spring (it may have been this, rather than the Chapel Row site, on which the Universal Warehouse was built). In August 1803 Driver advertised a great variety of goods for sale which illustrate how quickly the colony was developing from a penal encampment into a western consumption-oriented society. The goods for sale included green tea (unmixed and Souchong), sugar, butter, brazil tobacco, candles, soap, starch and blue, Capital Writing Fools-cap Paper, good coarse paper, stationery, copy and memorandum books, Juvenile Publications for the entertainment and improvement of Children, children's watches and toys, china tea sets, delft and manchester Tuesday, August 18, 2009 Page 1 of 32 cups, saucers and plates (plain and coloured), jugs, wash hand basins and tureens, fish plates and slides, soup plates, pepper mustard and salt islands, gridirons, flat smoothing irons, cutlery, scissors, men's and women's shoes, bonnets, perfumery, feathers, bands and flowers for bonnets, ribands, red flannel frocks, duck trousers, striped cotton shirts, Irish shirts (plain and frilled), leather breeches and boots, fine corded dimity, printed cotton and callico, checks, dungaree, flannel Laced Mode Cloaks (costing 3 to 5 guineas each), men's and women's stockings (black and white), gloves, cotton handkerchiefs, bandana and black Barcelone handkerchiefs, shoe strings, gloves, thread, tape, pins, needles (and other haberdashery), combs, gilt buttons, watch keys, seals, earrings, blacking cakes and tobacco pipes. Driver's advertisement in the Sydney Gazette of 16 October 1803 indicates a broadening of his clothing range with the additional items including glassware, English pint mugs in various sizes, looking glasses, common and fine hats, scarlet bird eyes and laces. The advertisement of 8 July 1804 included such additional items as raisins, Bengal printed cotton, Norwich and other fine shawls, gentlemen's and ladies' patent silk stockings, finger rings, beads, neck chains and other trinkets, punjums, nankeens, pens, India rubber, fancy waistcoats, artificial flowers and wreathes, Spanish shoes, tumblers and glasses. Driver held 40 acres by lease and purchase in 1806 which were not cultivated. Elizabeth held a publican's licence from 1803-1809 and was recorded with three male and two female children in 1806. Two of them Richard (1803) and Charles (c1805) were born at Sydney. The couple were strong supporters of the Rum Rebellion which resulted in Bligh's removal from power. John Driver was one of sixteen of the colony's principal inhabitants who signed a letter of support addressed to Major Johnston and written by John Macarthur on 26 January 1808, the day of the coup. Elizabeth subscribed £30 towards Macarthur's expenses for his anticipated trial in England. The Drivers are said to have displayed a sign in the hall of their house (probably their public house) on which a message painted in large characters read: "Success to Major George Johnson, may he live for ever! Our Deliverer and Suppressor of Tyrants". Driver received a 200 acre land grant at Cabramatta from the anti-Bligh regime. He died at his Chapel Row house on 28 February 1810 (aged about 36) having signed a will which appointed his wife sole executor and beneficiary. An obituary notice in the Sydney Gazette stated that he left a wife and five children "to regret the loss of a fond husband, and an indulgent parent, of whom it may also be asserted, that no man in existence had ever fewer enemies, or deserved them less". This widow married the Sydney dealer and publican Henry Marr on 29 October of the same year; she died on 3 January 1825 at the Star and Garter Inn at Portsmouth. She had only reached England three days earlier on her third return visit, and was buried in St. Thomas's Cathedral, Portsmouth, two days after her death. She rivalled Mary Reibey as the most prominent female emancipist of her day and was clearly a woman of considerable enterprise and ability. John Driver was probably the son of John Driver and Hester Harris born at Dursley and baptised at nearby Berkley on 25 July 1773; trial ref. Glos. RO Q/SO/10; Q/S/1a 1788; Driver had initially been charged with what was technically a capital offence of highway robbery, but the prosecution was undertaken on a less serious charge of theft, probably because of the boy's age and the fact that the theft was really a case of pick-pocketing. Driver's somewhat illegal will left his estate to Elizabeth, mentioning that they had been married ten (?) years on 29 May, suggesting a marriage in England in 1800; he was described as an innkeeper aged 38 at burial; in December 1808 Driver was granted a second lease in Chapel Row for an 81 rod allotment (whether this was the same land as the 1803 lease, or an adjoining or nearby allotment is not clear); some details contributed by J.R. Richards and G. O'Hagan, author of a booklet titled: "The Jewel Beyond the Sea: the Life and Times of Elizabeth Needham, 1762 to 1825 (Melbourne, 1991). John married Elizabeth Gore daughter of George Gore and Elizabeth Lake on 29 May, 1800 in Sydney, NSW, Australia. Elizabeth was born in 1761 and was christened in St George, Hanover Square, London, England. She died on 3 January, 1825 in Star & Garter, Portsmouth, England From "The Founders of Australia" by Mollie Gillen". Needham, Elizabeth (c1761-1825) Elizabeth Needham, said to be the wife of Henry Needham, was sentenced at the Old Bailey on 19 July 1786 to seven years transportation for theft of two pairs of silk stockings. The marriage of an Elizabeth Gore to Henry Needham at St. George's, Hanover Square, London is Tuesday, August 18, 2009 Page 2 of 32 recorded on 11 February 1782. In court she said she was servant to a perfumer in Bond Street, and challenged, said it was Grafter, which was also disproved. A petition for pardon was refused. "She told a long idle story about a ring given to [a colleague] by her father, who she said was a coachman to Lady Charlotte Finch, on account of which [the colleague] was to give her the stockings and a pair of buckles. Brought back to the shop on suspicion, the stockings fell from her. She behaved ill and made a disturbance" in the house. Aged 25, she was embarked on Lady Penrhyn on 9 January 1787. Bowes wrote that she was a needle worker, maker of childbed linen. The service of Elizabeth's father in the household of Lady Charlotte Finch was no help to her in avoiding sentence of transportation, but she would benefit greatly in later years. Lady Charlotte Finch, whose husband was the Rt. Hon. William Finch, vice chamberlain to the household of George III, was governess to the royal children from 1762 when the eldest son George (later George IV) was born, and to the later infant princes and princesses (she died in 1813, aged 88).